1995, 2nd Edition. Softcover
Published by Harper Perennial, New York
5.25" x 8". 230 Pages. Indexed. Illustrated.
ISBN: 0060925825

This book chronicles two journeys. In 1883, G. W. Sears ("Nessmuk") paddled 266 miles of Adirondack waterways. Over 100 years later, the author retraced his journey. In 1883, in a very light canoe, 61-year-old nature writer George Washington Sears made a 532-mile round-trip through almost the length of the Adirondacks. In 1990, editor and writer Jerome, no longer a girl herself and by no means seasoned to the rigors of outdoor life, set out to duplicate Sears' adventure in a Kevlar nine-footer modeled on Sears' Sairy Gamp. Her book is a chronicle of her trip--and also a history of American settlement of the Adirondacks, a synoptic biography of Sears, a comparison of the two, century-apart canoe journeys (which shows that the trips' environs have not changed all that much), and a miscellany of good advice to novice canoeists (e.g., "Donning dry clothes in the evening provides instant attitude adjustment").